True, but not in Oregon, New York and California where the standard for employer “undue hardship” is “significant cost and difficulty.”
Gregory W. Hamilton, President Northwest Religious Liberty Association 5709 N. 20th Street Ridgefield, WA 98642 Office: (360) 857-7040 Website: www.nrla.com<http://www.nrla.com/> [NRLA2013-final-350px]<http://www.nrla.com/> Championing Religious Freedom and Human Rights From: religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu [mailto:religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Steven Jamar Sent: Monday, February 22, 2016 11:53 AM To: Law Religion & Law List <religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu> Subject: Re: help wanted I don’t think Title VII does the work here — the undue hardship standard is so de minimis as to be illusory in most cases where it would matter. On Feb 22, 2016, at 1:51 PM, Greg Hamilton <greg.hamil...@nw.npuc.org<mailto:greg.hamil...@nw.npuc.org>> wrote: From my vantage point in introducing, shepherding and helping to pass Idaho’s Free Exercise of Religion Act of 2000, and in failing with both Alaska and Oregon state Religious Freedom Restoration Act efforts over an 18-year period since 1998 is mostly a political one, albeit a constitutional one. It is obvious why, given the problem under the current circumstances—the U.S. Supreme Court’s upholding of same-sex marriage as constitutional under the Equal Protection Clause, which we don’t consider to be an unhappy problem. We helped defeat Montana’s radical RFRA bill proposal in the 2015 legislative session because it had all kinds of Establishment Clause problems, along with attempting to provide blank exemptions to small business owners, which we believe are best handled by the courts when factoring in motivation and context of each situation. A similar state religious freedom restoration act proposal was introduced in Washington State, but it didn’t make it out of Committee for similar reasons. Finally, isn’t Title VII anti-discrimination/accommodation law, along with the Federal RFRA law, more than already satisfactory to address this matter involving state and federal employees? Gregory W. Hamilton, President Northwest Religious Liberty Association 5709 N. 20th Street Ridgefield, WA 98642 Office: (360) 857-7040 Website: www.nrla.com<http://www.nrla.com/> <image001.jpg><http://www.nrla.com/> Championing Religious Freedom and Human Rights From: religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu<mailto:religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu> [mailto:religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Steven Jamar Sent: Monday, February 22, 2016 8:39 AM To: Law Religion & Law List <religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu<mailto:religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu>> Subject: help wanted How might Congress draft a federal law that requires states to accommodate religious beliefs so that state employees are free to refuse to perform tasks that are contrary to their religious beliefs? We have the Boerne problems of making a record and RFRA being held to be too much of a bludgeon. But assuming we could somehow get past that, what would the language be? Could this work: "Every state must accommodate the religious beliefs and practices of its employees and those persons with which it contracts by exempting them from performing tasks that are contrary to their religious beliefs.” Even assuming the record-requirement part of Boerne could be met, I just can’t seem to craft language that I think would be likely to pass constitutional muster. So, help wanted. Steve -- Prof. Steven D. Jamar Howard University School of Law vox: 202-806-8017 fax: 202-806-8567 http://sdjlaw.org<http://sdjlaw.org/> “It’s not the note you play that’s the wrong note – it’s the note you play afterwards that makes it right or wrong.” Miles Davis _______________________________________________ To post, send message to Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu<mailto:Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu> To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/religionlaw Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or wrongly) forward the messages to others. -- Prof. Steven D. Jamar Assoc. Dir. of International Programs Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice http://iipsj.org http://sdjlaw.org "Politics hates a vacuum. If it isn't filled with hope, someone will fill it with fear." Naomi Klein
_______________________________________________ To post, send message to Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/religionlaw Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or wrongly) forward the messages to others.
